Transmission system and receiver using teletext information for programming video recorder

ABSTRACT

A method and system in which television-program table information is transmitted using teletext formats in a coding transmission system. On the reception side, reservation of video recording with an image recording apparatus is effected by making use of the transmitted television-program table information. Reserving a recording time is accomplished using a program recognition device 9 which detects that the television-program table information has been transmitted. Further, a program update recognition device 10, a channel information processing device 11, a date information processing device 12, a time information processing device 13, a program code information processing device 14, and a title information processing device 15 serve to process their respective information in order to display the television program table on a display unit. Once displayed, a television program desired for video recording is selected by a cursor display device and selection device 19. The advantageous result is a simplified implementation of reservation of video recording.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present invention relates to a transmission system and a receiverfor, on the transmission side, transmitting television-program tableinformation such as channel information, date information, timeinformation, program code information, and title information usingteletext of the coding transmission system and, meanwhile on thereception side, reserving a video recording on imagerecording/reproducing apparatus using the received television-programtable information.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

In recent years, a teletext of coding transmission system has come intopractical use that allows character and graphic information such asnews, weather forecasts, and stock market, which are provided bycombinations of characters and graphics, to be presented on a screen ofa household television receiver. Also, there have been developedtelevision receivers with a built-in receiver for receiving teletext ina coding transmission system. Hereinbelow, the teletext and its teletextreceiver equipment in a coding transmission system as described aboveare explained with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows a construction of a conventional teletext receiver. In thefigure, represented by reference character a is a television videosignal; so by numeral 1 is a character signal extracting section forextracting character signals superimposed on the vertical blankingintervals from the video signal a; 2 is a data block linking section forlinking the character signals in the units of data blocks extracted bythe character signal extracting section 1 and classifying them into datagroups; 3 is a data type deciding section for deciding whether the datagroups classified by the data block linking section 2 are program data,page data, or index data; 4 is a character-program data decoder sectionfor decoding character-program data according to the types of datadecided by the data type deciding section 3 to develop the data intocharacters and graphics for display; 5 is a buffer memory section foraccumulating the signals decided as character-program data by the datatype deciding section 3; 6 is a display control section for actuallydisplaying display data developed into characters and graphics at thecharacter-program data decoder section 4 on a screen or the like; 7 is avideo memory section for storing display data to be actually displayedon the screen or the like by the display control section 6; and 8 is asound generator section for performing actual sound generation accordingto added sound data decoded by the character-program data decodersection 4.

FIG. 2 shows the hierarchy of a teletext signal of the codingtransmission system. In the FIG. 2, hierarchy 1 is a physical layer,representing the item elements of a character signal as anelectrophysical signal. This signal is also superimposed on 14H, 15H,16H, and 21H of the vertical blanking interval of the television signal.At a link layer of a hierarchy 2, the character signal is treated aslogical data of either 1 or 0. Data lines, each of which refers to atransmission unit of character signals transmitted during one horizontalscanning line interval of a television video signal, is composed of asynchronization part and a data packet. The data packet, which refers toa part of the data line in which the synchronization part is eliminated,is composed of a prefix, data blocks, and check codes. Primarily thefunction of prefix is exerted at hierarchy 3 of a network layer. Theprefix refers to data for identification and control, added to the headof the data packet, while the data blocks refer to a part of the datapacket in which the prefix and the check code are eliminated, fortransmitting various types of information data. Hierarchy 4 is atransport layer, representing the functions of data groups. The datagroups are composed of data groups, each being one group of informationdata transmitted by one data block or a plurality of data blocks.Hierarchy 5 is a session layer, representing the structure of programdata and functions for identification control of the program, and thelike. Hierarchy 6 is a presentation layer, representing the functions ofcoding the presentation, where the coding for displaying characters andgraphics and for presenting added sounds is specified.

FIG. 3 shows the structure of program management data and page data.Transmitted to the head of the program data is program management datapertaining to the whole of the program. The program management data orpage data is composed of a data header and several units.

FIG. 4 shows the structure of a data group header and the transmissionprocedure thereof. Referring to FIG. 4, the data group header iscomposed of a data group identification code for identifying andcontrolling data groups, a data group retransmission code, a data grouplink code, a data group serial number, data group size, and workingdata. In this structure, the data group identification code representsthe type of a data group by binary value, where program management dataor page data is assigned "0", while program index data is assigned "15."

FIG. 5 shows the structure of a data header and the transmissionprocedure thereof. Referring to FIG. 5, the data header is composed ofdata-header identification, data-header data length, and data-headerdata. The data-header identification represents the function ofidentifying the type of a data header, and the coding representationthereof is composed of an information separation code and data-headerparameters. Correspondence between data headers and parameters is suchthat program data header, page data header, program search data header,and continuation data header correspond to data-header parameters02/0-3, respectively.

FIG. 6 shows the structure of a data unit and the transmission procedurethereof. Referring to FIG. 6, the data unit is composed of data-unitidentification, data-unit data length, and unit data. The data-unitidentification represents the function of identifying the type of a dataunit, and the coding representation thereof is composed of a data-unitseparation code and data-unit parameters. Data-unit parameters of thecurrent system are assigned 16 types of identification parameters suchas text, header text, a color map, and a program index. A data-unit linkflag represents whether or not the succeeding data unit is acontinuation data unit and to be linked, while the data-unit data lengthrepresents the data length of a data-unit data. The data-unit data is apiece of data that represents the number of data represented bydata-unit data length.

FIG. 7 shows the assignment of the current data-unit parameters. In FIG.7, the blank fields are unused.

FIG. 8 gives an example of coding in the current teletext. In FIG. 8,there are two data units, and data-unit parameters are "24H" and "20H,"these two data units representing "header text" and "text,"respectively.

The teletext receiver equipment constructed as in FIG. 1 is nowdescribed about its operation.

From the input video signal a, the character signal extracting section 1extracts character signals superimposed on the vertical blankingintervals 14H, 15H, 16H, and 21H. The data block linking section 2 picksup data blocks out of the character signals extracted at the charactersignal extracting section 1, and thereafter links the data andclassifies them into data groups. The data type deciding section 3decides whether the data groups classified by the data block linkingsection 2 are program data, page data, or index data, according to datagroup identification codes. Thereafter, the character-program datadecoder section 4 accumulates character-program data derived from thedata type deciding section 3 in the buffer memory section 5, while itextracts character-program data pertaining to a program number needingpresentation from the character-program data accumulated in the buffermemory section 5. According to the type of the character-program data,character signals are decoded as shown in FIG. 8, and the resultingcharacter/graphic screen information is written into the video memorysection 7 through the display control section 6. The display controlsection 6 sequentially reads the character/graphic screen informationwritten into the video memory section 7, yielding an output of displaysignal b. Further, if the program data needing presentation has anyadded sound information, the character-program data decoder section 4decodes the added sound information, and transmits sound-generation datato the sound generator section 8, where the sound generator section 8produces a sound signal based on the sound-generation data.

In the teletext, data transmission is carried out in the above-describedtransmission procedure. On the side of teletext receiving equipment,character and graphic information coded according to the transmissionprocedure are decoded, offering the services that still images such asnews and weather forecasts are displayed on television. More recently,with a view to making the teletext further widespread, new services areunder discussion in which television-program table information (programtitle, program broadcasting date, program broadcasting time, etc.) areencoded, transmitted as data unit data by expanding the transmissionprocedure while compatibility with the conventional teletext ismaintained (i.e. by defining new parameters), so as to allow theteletext to be utilized for video recording reservation by imagerecording/reproducing apparatus such as VTRs. However, the conventionalteletext receiving equipment cannot afford such expansion of thetransmission procedure as it stands, prohibiting their users fromenjoying the new services.

Meanwhile, since the operation for recording reservation with thecurrent VTRs is so complicated and difficult to understand thatbeginners and those unfamiliar to video/audio appliances cannot manageit. This accounts for the strong desire that this operation forrecording reservation be made easier.

The present invention, in view of the foregoing problems, has developeda transmission system in which television-program table information isdefined on transmission, and further provides a receiving apparatus inwhich the television-program table information is recognized andprocessed on the receiver side so that the recording reservation in theimage recording/reproducing apparatus can be simplified and that changein the time of recording reserved programs can be treated.

DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION

The transmission system according to the present invention ischaracterized in that, for use in a system in which, on the transmissionside, television-program table information such as channel information,date information, time information, program code information, and titleinformation are transmitted using the teletext of coding transmissionsystem while, on the reception side, reservation of a video recording onan image recording/reproducing apparatus is effected by making use ofthe received television-program table information, data-unit parametersfor television-program table information by the teletext of the codingtransmission system are newly provided, and wherein program-contentupdate information, channel information, date information, timeinformation, program code information, and title information of thetelevision-program table information are transmitted as data-unit data.

The receiver according to the present invention is characterized in thatit comprises: a first program recognition means for recognizingtelevision-program table information by providing a limitation ontelevision-program table information; a first program update recognizingand processing means for recognizing and processing program-contentupdate information from data-unit data; a first channel informationprocessing means for processing channel information from the data-unitdata; a first date information processing means for processing dateinformation; a first time information processing means for processingtime information; a first program code information processing means forprocessing program code information; a first title informationprocessing means for processing title information; display means fordisplaying data processed by the first program update recognizing andprocessing means, the first channel information processing means, thefirst date information processing means, the first time informationprocessing means, the first program code information processing means,and the first title information processing means onto a display unit;cursor display means for displaying a cursor for each one of thetelevision programs displayed by the display means; cursor moving meansfor moving the cursor displayed by the cursor display means for eachprogram; selection means for selecting reservation of a video recordingof a television program designated by the cursor of the cursor displaymeans; storage means for storing television-program table informationsuch as channel information, date information, time information, programcode information, and title information of the television programselected by the selection means; timer means for performing timemanagement; comparator means for comparing between date information andtime information of the video-recording reserved program stored in thestorage means with date information and time information of the timermeans; start instruction means for instructing an imagerecording/reproducing apparatus to start a video-recording operationwhen start time information of the date information and the timeinformation of the video-recording reserved program coincides with thedate information and the time information of the timer means; andtermination time instruction means for instructing the imagerecording/reproducing apparatus to terminate the video-recordingoperation when termination time information of the date information andthe time information of the video-recording reserved program coincideswith the date information and the time information of the timer means.

According to the feature of the present invention having such anarrangement as described above, reservation of a video recording to besimply rendered on an image recording/reproducing apparatus is allowedonly by automatically detecting a television-program table program outof teletext programs, taking out information necessary for videorecording reservation in the image recording/reproducing apparatus anddisplaying them onto a display unit, and selecting information such astitle name on a television-program table displayed on the display unitwith a cursor. Further, even if the television program for which a videorecording has been rendered on an image recording/reproducing apparatusshould be canceled because of any change or extension of the program onthe transmission side, or even if its broadcasting time should bechanged, these changes and extensions could be automatically followed upif television-program table information which includes the contents ofthe change on teletext is transmitted, thus allowing the video recordingof the reserved television program to be carried out by automaticallyfollowing.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a conventional teletext receiver; FIG. 2 isa view showing a hierarchy of a teletext signal in a coding transmissionsystem; FIG. 3 is a view showing a structure of program management dataand page data; FIG. 4 is a view showing the structure of the data groupheader and the transmission procedure thereof; FIG. 5 is a view showingthe structure of the data header and the transmission procedure thereof;FIG. 6 is a view showing the structure of the data unit and thetransmission procedure thereof; FIG. 7 is a view showing the assignmentof the current data-unit parameters; FIG. 8 is a view showing an exampleof coding in the conventional teletext; FIG. 9 is a functional blockdiagram showing the construction of a transmission system and a receiveraccording to an embodiment of the present invention; FIG. 10 is a viewshowing an exemplary structure of the television-program table programdata unit; FIG. 11 is a functional block diagram of a receiver accordingto a second embodiment of the present invention; FIG. 12 is a viewshowing the bit assignment of a page presentation device; FIG. 13 is aview showing the bit assignment of presentation update control; FIG. 14is a view showing an example of screen arrangement of atelevision-program table program; FIG. 15 is a functional block diagramof a receiver according to a third embodiment of the present invention;FIG. 16 is a functional block diagram of a receiver according to afourth embodiment of the present invention; FIG. 17 is a schematic viewshowing the structure of the data group header and data header of datato be transmitted to the same receiver and the transmission procedurethereof; FIG. 18 is a schematic view showing the structure of the dataunit of the same data and the transmission procedure thereof; FIG. 19 isa view for explaining a fifth embodiment of the invention, schematicallyshowing another structure of the same data unit and the transmissionprocedure thereof; FIG. 20 is a view for explaining a sixth embodimentof the invention, schematically showing yet another structure of thesame data unit and the transmission procedure thereof; FIG. 21 is afunctional block diagram of a receiver according to a seventh embodimentof the invention; FIG. 22 is a view for explaining the operation in FIG.21, schematically showing an example of the structure of a data group ofprogram type information; FIG. 23 is a functional block diagram of areceiver according to an eighth embodiment of the invention; and FIG. 24is a view for explaining the operation in FIG. 22, schematically showingan example of the structure of a data group of time information.

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION

Now the transmission system and receiver according to the firstembodiment of the present invention is described below with reference tothe drawings.

FIG. 9 shows the construction of a receiver according to the firstembodiment of the invention.

In FIG. 9, represented by reference character A is a reception means forreceiving teletext in a coding transmission system. In the receptionmeans A, designated by numeral 1 is a character signal extractingsection for extracting character signals superimposed on the verticalblanking period from a video signal a; 4 is a decoder section fordecoding the character signals extracted from the character signalextracting section 1 to develop into character graphics for display; 5is a buffer memory section for accumulating only the character signalsextracted at the character signal extracting section 1; 6 is a displaycontrol section for actually displaying display data developed intocharacter graphics at the decoder section 4 on a screen or the like; 7is a video memory section for storing display data to be actuallydisplayed on the screen or the like by the display control section 6;and 8 is a sound generator section for performing actual soundgeneration according to added sound data decoded by the decoder section4, all of which are designated by like numerals as in FIG. 1. Further,designated by numeral 9 is a first program recognition means forrecognizing television-program table information from data-unitparameters; 10 is a first program update recognizing and processingmeans for recognizing and processing program-content update informationfrom the data-unit data detected by the first program recognition means9; 11 is a first channel information processing means for processingchannel information from the data-unit data detected by the firstprogram recognition means 9; 12 is a first date information processingmeans for processing date information from the data-unit data detectedby the first program recognition means 9; 13 is a first time informationprocessing means for processing time information from the data-unit datadetected by the first program recognition means 9; 14 is a first programcode information processing means for processing program codeinformation from the data-unit data detected by the first programrecognition means 9; 15 is a first title information processing meansfor processing title information from the data-unit data detected by thefirst program recognition means 9; 16 is a display means for displayingdata processed by the first program update recognizing and processingmeans 10, the first channel information processing means 11, the firstdate information processing means 12, the first time informationprocessing means 13, the first program code information processing means14, and the first title information processing means 15, for exampleonto a CRT screen of the a television receiver; 17 is a cursor displaymeans for displaying a cursor for each one program of the televisionprograms displayed by the display means 16; 18 is a cursor moving meansfor moving the cursor displayed by the cursor display means 17 for eachprogram; 19 is a selection means for selecting video-recordingreservation of a television program designated by the cursor of thecursor display means 17; 20 is a storage means for storingtelevision-program table information such as channel information, dateinformation, time information, program code information, and titleinformation of the television program selected by the selection means19; 21 is a timer means for performing time management; 22 is acomparator means for comparing date information and time information ofthe video-recording reserved program stored in the storage means 20 withdate information and time information of the timer means 21; 23 is astart instruction means for instructing an image recording/reproducingapparatus 25 to start a video-recording operation when date informationand time information of the video-recording reserved program coincideswith date information and time information of the timer means 21 by thecomparator means 22; and 24 is a termination instruction means forinstructing the image recording/reproducing apparatus 25 to terminatethe video-recording operation when date information and time informationof the video-recording reserved program coincides with date informationand time information of the timer means 21 by the comparator means 22.In addition, numeral 25 denotes an image recording/reproducing apparatussuch as a video tape recorder.

The receiver constructed as described above is below described withregard to its operation, referring to FIG. 9.

First, the character signal extracting section 1 extracts charactersignals superimposed on 14H, 15H, 16H, and 21H from the input videosignal a. The decoder section 4 accumulates the character signalsextracted at the character signal extracting section 1 in the buffermemory section 5 while it extracts program data pertaining to a programnumber needing presentation from the character signals accumulated inthe buffer memory section 5, and it further performs the decoding ofcharacter signals such as shown in FIG. 8, writing character/graphicscreen information into the video memory section 7 through the displaycontrol section 6. The display control section 6 sequentially reads thecharacter/graphic screen information written into the video memorysection 7, yielding an output of display signal b. The decoder section 4further decodes added sound information, if there is any added soundinformation in the program data needing presentation, thereaftertransmitting sound-generation data to the sound generator section 8. Thesound generator section 8 yields an output based on the sound-generationdata.

The detection of television-program table programs is carried out by thefirst program recognition means 9. The recognition of television-programtable programs is carried out by the data-unit parameters as shown inFIG. 7. The data-unit parameters representing television-program tableprograms are hexadecimal data, which may be any 1-byte data except 20,24, 28, 2C, 30, 31, 32, 34, 35, 38, 39, 3B, 3C, 3D, 3E, and 3F. Anexample of the structure of the television-program table program dataunit is shown in FIG. 10. Out of the television-program table data unitrecognized and extracted by the first program recognition means 9, thefirst channel information processing means 11 reads channel informationfrom byte-6 to byte-11 data of the television-program table data unit.The first program update recognizing and processing means 10 readsprogram version data from byte 5 of the television-program table dataunit. The first date information processing means 12 reads monthinformation from byte 12 and date information from byte 13 of thetelevision-program table data unit. The first time informationprocessing means 13 reads start hour information from byte 14 and startminute information from byte 15 of the television-program table dataunit. By the MSB, b8 of byte 14, it is decided whether or not thereexists any terminate time information. It also reads terminate hourinformation from byte 16 and terminate minute information from byte 17.When terminate time information is omitted, the data that follow areshifted by 2 bytes. The first program code information processing means14 reads program code information from byte 18 of the television-programtable data unit. The first program title information processing means 15reads title information by the number of bytes representing titledata-length data of byte 19 of the television-program table data unit.Similarly, it reads the second and following television-program tableinformation data. The pieces of information read by the first programupdate recognizing and processing means 10, the first channelinformation processing means 11, the first date information processingmeans 12, the first time information processing means 13, and the firsttitle information processing means 15 are each displayed onto the CRTscreen through the display means 16. The cursor display means 17displays a cursor representing a television program to be selected onthe CRT screen, while the cursor moving means 18 moves the position ofthe cursor outputted by the cursor display means 17, thereby allowing adesired television program to be selected by the selection means 19. Theselected television-program table information are stored in series inthe first storage means 20. If any content of the television-programtable information stored in the first storage means 20 are updated, acomparison is made between the content information of the relevantprogram and the contents of the television-program table informationstored in the first storage means 20 through the first program updaterecognizing and processing means 10, where if there is any change in thecontents, the contents of the television-program table informationstored in the first storage means 20 is rewritten into new data. Thecontents of the television-program table information stored in the firststorage means 20 are at all times compared with date and time data ofthe timer means 21 by the comparator means 22. Then, out of thetelevision-program table information stored in the storage means 20,when the date and time data obtained by the first date informationprocessing means 12 and the start time data obtained by the first timeinformation processing means 13 coincide with each other, the startinstruction means 23 instructs the image recording/reproducing apparatus25 to start the video recording. Similarly, as for the instruction fortermination of the video recording, the contents of thetelevision-program table information stored in the first storage means20 are at all times compared with date and time data of the timer means21, followed by the processing. That is, among the television-programtable information stored in the first storage means 20, when the dateand time data obtained by the first date information processing means 12and the terminate time data obtained by the first time informationprocessing means 13 coincide with each other, the terminationinstruction means 24 instructs the image recording/reproducing apparatus25 to terminate the video-recording operation.

As described above, according to the present embodiment, there are newlyprovided data-unit parameters for television-program table informationby teletext in the coding transmission system, and in this arrangementprogram-content update information, channel information, dateinformation, time information, program code information, titleinformation, and the like of the television-program table information istransmitted as data-unit data. As a result, on the reception side,television-program table information can be automatically detected anddisplayed on a display unit; and a television program displayed on thescreen can be simply reserved for video recording on an imagerecording/reproducing apparatus only by selecting a cursor; andinformation of teletext can be effectively utilized in the receiverequipment. Also, it is possible to follow up any change intelevision-program table information.

Next the transmission system and receiver according to a secondembodiment of the present invention is described below with reference tothe drawings.

FIG. 11 shows the construction of the main part of the receiveraccording to the second embodiment of the invention. The charactersignal extracting section 1, the display control section 6, and thefirst storage means 20 are the same as those in FIG. 9, correspondingly.

In FIG. 11, designated by numeral 26 is a second program recognitionmeans for recognizing television-program table information from bit 3 ofa page presentation device; 27 is a second program update recognizingand processing means for recognizing and processing program-contentupdate information from bit 3, bit 4, bit 7, and bit 8 of thepresentation update control detected by the second program recognitionmeans 26; 28 is a second channel information processing means forprocessing channel information of the 1st character string on text line1 from the television-program table information detected by the secondprogram recognition means 26; 29 is a second date information processingmeans for processing date information of the 2nd character string ontext line 1 from the television-program table information detected bythe second program recognition means 26; 30 is a second time informationprocessing means for processing time information from thetelevision-program table information detected by the second programrecognition means 26; 31 is a second program code information processingmeans for processing program code information from thetelevision-program table information detected by the second programrecognition means 26; and 32 is a second title information processingmeans for processing title information from the television-program tableinformation detected by the second program recognition means 26.

The receiver constructed as described above is below described withregard to its operation with reference to FIGS. 11, 12, and 13.

The detection of a television-program table program is performed by thesecond program recognition means 26. The recognition of atelevision-program table program is performed by bit 3 of the pagepresentation device shown in FIG. 12. Bit 1 of the page presentationdevice designates whether or not a character program is to be presentedon the display, while bit 2 designates whether or not a characterprogram is to be presented on the printer. Bit 3 represents whether ornot it is a television-program table program. Bits 4 to 8 are unused.The content update recognition of a television-program table program isperformed by the second program update processing means 27.

The content update recognition of a television-program table program isperformed by bit 3, bit 4, bit 7, and bit 8 of the presentation updatecontrol shown in FIG. 13. Bit 1 of the presentation update controlrepresents display rewrite, bit 2 page content updater bit 5 imageinitialize inhibit, bit 6 sound initialize inhibit, and bits 3, 4, 7,and 8 are treated as 4-bit data, which is television-program tableupdate data for rendering one increment each time any program content isupdated.

An example of the screen arrangement of a television-program tableprogram is shown in FIG. 14. The second channel information processingmeans 28 recognizes a channel from "NHK," which is the channelinformation of the 1st character string on text line 1, out of thescreen arrangement of the television-program table program recognizedand displayed by the second program recognition means 26. The seconddate information processing means 29 recognizes a date from "12/1,"which is the date information of the 2nd character string on text line1, out of the screen arrangement of the television-program table programrecognized and displayed by the second program recognition means 26. Thesecond time information processing means 30 recognizes start time andterminate time from the 1st character string on each text line out ofthe screen arrangement of the television-program table programrecognized and displayed by the second program recognition means 26. Thesecond program code information processing means 31 recognizes 2-byteprogram code (represented by such numbers as "22," "23," . . . "27")that succeeds the time information out of the screen arrangement of thetelevision-program table program recognized and displayed by the secondprogram recognition means 26. The second title information processingmeans 32 recognizes the character string as the title information thatfollows the program code information and precedes the next timeinformation out of the screen arrangement of the television-programtable program recognized and displayed by the second program recognitionmeans 26.

The rest of the operation is in principle the same as in the firstembodiment.

As described above, according to the present embodiment, bits of a pagepresentation device are assigned for designation of television-programtable programs by the teletext in the coding transmission system, 4 bitsof the presentation update control are assigned for instruction onupdate of the television-program table information, and information suchas channel information, date information, time information, program codeinformation, and title information are recognized from the screenarrangement, whereby the television-program table information can beautomatically detected and displayed on a CRT screen without newlydefining data units. Moreover, only by selecting a television programdisplayed on the CRT screen by a cursor (represented by square framessurrounding a program code shown in FIG. 14), it is possible to simplyrender a video recording reservation of an image recording/reproducingapparatus contributing to effective use of information on teletext atthe receiver. Of course, it also follows up any change in thetelevision-program table information.

Next the transmission system and receiver according to a thirdembodiment of the present invention is described below with reference tothe drawings.

FIG. 15 shows the structure of the main part of a receiver according tothe third embodiment of the invention. The character signal extractingsection 1, the display control section 6, the first storage means 20,the second channel information processing means 28, the second dateinformation processing means 29, the second time information processingmeans 30, the second program code information processing means 31, andthe second title information processing means 32 are the same as thosein FIG. 9 and FIG. 11.

In FIG. 15, designated by numeral 33 is a third program recognitionmeans for recognizing television-program table information from programnumbers of fixed television-program table information; and 34 is a thirdprogram update recognizing and processing means for recognizing andprocessing update of program contents from the contents of the displayscreen of the television-program table information detected by the thirdprogram recognition means 33.

The receiver constructed as described above is below described withregard to its operation with reference to FIG. 15.

The detection of a television-program table program is performed by thethird program recognition means 33 which detects the fixed programnumbers of the television program table information. The recognition ofcontent update of a television-program table program is performed by thethird program update recognizing and processing means 34. Forrecognition of update of television-program table information, it isdecided whether any update has occurred or not, based on an arrangementthat the program code of the program reserved for video recording insuch a manner as in the first embodiment in FIG. 14 is stored incorrespondence to its relevant time information and title information.

The rest of the operation is in principle the same as in the first andsecond embodiments.

As described above, according to the present embodiment, fixed programnumbers are assigned for designation of television-program tableprograms on teletext in the coding transmission system, and instructionon update of the television-program table information is performed withthe screen arrangement and recognized from difference in the timeinformation or title information corresponding to a program code,whereby television-program table information can be automaticallydetected and displayed on the CRT screen without newly defining dataunits or newly making bit assignments. Also, television programsdisplayed on the CRT screen can be simply reserved for video recordingon an image recording/reproducing apparatus only by selecting thetelevision program with the cursor, allowing the information on teletextto be effectively utilized on the receiver. In addition, it can followup any change in the television-program table information.

Next a fourth embodiment of the present invention is described referringto FIG. 16. The transmission system of the present embodiment is of thesignal arrangement of teletext in the coding transmission system inwhich first at the data group header section, a sign for identifyingthat it is added service data is newly assigned to a data groupidentification sign that serves to identify program management data orpage data and program index data. Further at the data header section, achannel identification number for identifying a broadcasting channel, aprogram content update index for notifying any update of programcontents, and a program broadcasting date for showing the broadcastingdate of a program are added as data, while a parameter foridentification of being a data header related to added services is newlyassigned to the data header parameters for identifying a program dataheader, a page header, and a program search data header. Furthermore atthe data unit section, there are added television-program identificationnumbers for identifying each television program to be broadcast a day,program broadcasting start time, program broadcasting terminate time,program-classification identification indexes for showing the Glass of aprogram content, and program title data length for showing the datalength of a program title, as program title data, while to the data-unitparameters for identifying the type of a data unit such as text, headertext, and added sound information there is newly assigned a parameterfor identifying that it is added service data, whereby all of these dataare transmitted.

In FIG. 16, reference character A denotes a receiver means for receivingteletext in the coding transmission system. In this receiver means A,designated by numeral 1 is a character signal extracting section forextracting character signals superimposed in the vertical blankingperiods from the video signal a; 2 is a data block linking section forlinking the character signals in the units of data blocks extracted bythe character signal extracting section 1 and classifying them into datagroups; 3 is a data type deciding section for deciding whether the datagroups classified by the data block linking section 2 arecharacter-program data or added data; 4 is a character-program datadecoder section for decoding the signals decided as character-programdata by the data type deciding section 3 to develop them into charactergraphics for display; 5 is a buffer memory section for accumulating thesignals decided as character-program data by the data type decidingsection 3; 36 is an added data decoder section for decoding the signalsdecided as added data by the data type deciding section 3 and developingthem into character graphics for display; 37 is a buffer memory sectionfor accumulating the signals decided as added data by the data typedeciding section 3; 38 is an image recording/reproducing apparatuscontrol section for generating a control signal to an imagerecording/reproducing apparatus 39 by control information obtained bythe added data decoder section 36; 6 is a display control section foractually displaying display data developed into character graphics atthe character-program data decoder section 4 and the added data decodersection 36, onto a screen or the like; 7 is a video memory section forstoring display data to be actually displayed onto a screen or the likeby the display control section 6; and 8 is a sound generator section foractually generating sounds according to added sound data decoded by thecharacter program data decoder section 4.

FIG. 17 shows the structure of the data group header and data header onteletext of the present invention and its transmission procedure, whileFIG. 18 shows the structure of the data unit in the same teletext andits transmission procedure.

In FIG. 17, at the data header section, a channel identification numberfor identifying broadcast channels, a program-content update index fornotifying update of program contents, and a program broadcasting daterepresenting the broadcasting date of programs are added as data. Also,at the data group header section, a sign for identification of beingadded service data is newly assigned to a data group identificationsign, while at the data header section a parameter for identification ofbeing a date header related to added services is newly assigned to thedata header parameters individually. In this case, the data groupidentification sign for identifying that it is added service data ishexadecimal data, i.e., 4-bit data except 0 and F. Also, the data headerparameter for identification of being a data header related to addedservices is hexadecimal data, which may be any 1-byte data except 20,21, 22, and 23.

In FIG. 18, at the data unit section, a television-programidentification number for identifying each television program to bebroadcasted a day, program broadcasting start time, program broadcastingterminate time, a program-classification identification index forrepresenting the class of the contents of a program, a program titledata length for representing the data length of a program title, and aprogram title are added as data. Further, a parameter for identificationof being added service data is newly assigned to the data-unitparameters for identifying the type of a data unit such as text, headertext and added sound information. In this case, the data-unit parameterfor identification of being added service data is hexadecimal data,which may be any 1-byte data except 20, 24, 28, 2C, 30, 31, 32, 34, 35,38, 39, 3B, 3C, 3D, 3E, and 3F.

The receiver constructed as described above is below described withregard to its operation, referring to FIGS. 16 to 18.

First, as in the signal reception processes of the conventionalteletext, character signals superimposed on 14H, 15H, 16H, and 21H ofthe vertical blanking periods of a television signal are extracted froman input video signal a at the character signal extracting section 1.The data block linking section 2 picks up data blocks out of thecharacter signals extracted by the data signal extracting section 1 andthereafter links and classifies them into data groups. The data typedeciding section 3 decides whether the data groups classified by thedata block linking section 2 are character-program data or added data,according to their data group identification signs, and then thecharacter-program data, if so decided, is processed for decoding at thecharacter-program data decoder section 4, while the added data, if sodecided, is processed for decoding at the added data decoder section 36.

The processing that follow branches here into character-program dataprocessing and added data processing. First described is thecharacter-program data processing.

After decided as character-program data at the data type decidingsection 3, the output signal from the data type deciding section 3 isput into the character-program data decoder section 4. Thecharacter-program data decoder section 4 accumulates thecharacter-program data from the data type deciding section 3 into thebuffer memory section 5 while it extracts character-program data of theprogram number needing presentation from the character-program dataaccumulated in the buffer memory section 5 and then it decodes thecharacter signal as shown in FIG. 8, whereby the character/graphicscreen information is written into the video memory section 7 throughthe display control section 6. The display control section 6sequentially reads the character/graphic screen information written intothe video memory section 7, thus yielding an output of display signal b.Moreover, if there is any added sound information in the program dataneeding presentation, the character-program data decoder section 4decodes the added sound information, transmitting sound generation datato the sound generator section 8. The sound generator section 8 producesa sound signal according to the sound generation data.

Next, the added data processing is described. After decided as addeddata by the data type deciding section 3, the output signal from thedata type deciding section 3 is put into the added data decoder section36. The added data decoder section 36 accumulates the added data fromthe data type deciding section 3 in the buffer memory section 37, whileit extracts added data needing presentation from the added data storedin the buffer memory section 37, where it is decoded. The procedure foraccumulating added data into the buffer memory section 37 comprises:reading the program-content update index, starting with byte 12, if itis identified as added data with the data header parameter (see FIG.17); and comparing it with the previously read index. Then if they areidentical to each other, it is decided that there has been no change inprogram contents, and thus the transmitted television-program tableinformation is invalidated. If not identical, it is decided that therehas been some change in program contents, in which case the presentlytransmitted television-program table information is accumulated astelevision-program table information in the buffer memory section 37.

Further, the procedure for decoding added data is below described. It isassumed here that a selected piece of television-program tableinformation is the first program. If it is decided as added data by thedata header parameter at the data header section, the channelidentification number from byte 11 and the program broadcasting date oftwo bytes from byte 13 are picked up as information (see FIG. 17). Thenif it is decided as added data by the data-unit parameter at the dataunit section, the television-program identification number pertaining tothe first program from the fifth byte, the program broadcasting starttime pertaining to the first program of 2 bytes starting with byte 6,the program broadcasting terminate time pertaining to the first programof two bytes starting from eighth byte 8, the program-classificationidentification index pertaining to the first program starting from thetenth byte 10, the program title data length pertaining to the firstprogram starting from the eleventh byte 11, and program title pertainingto the first program starting from the twelfth byte 12 are picked up asinformation (see FIG. 18). The television-program table informationpicked up are put into the image recording/reproducing apparatus controlsection 38, where the image recording/reproducing apparatus controlsection 38 produces an image recording/reproducing apparatus controlsignal thereby to control the image recording/reproducing apparatus 39.If there is any data for the second and following programs, the data forthe second and following program are recorded as repetition of datasimilar to that pertaining to the first program on the buffer memorysection 37.

As described above, according to the present embodiment, there are newlyassigned a data group identification sign, a data header parameter, anda data-unit parameter pertaining to added data according to teletext inthe coding transmission system, and in this arrangement, program-contentupdate information, channel information, date information of thetelevision-program table information are transmitted as data-header datawhile time information, program type information, title information, andthe like are transmitted as data-unit data, whereby thetelevision-program table information can be automatically detected anddisplayed onto a CRT screen, allowing a television program to bereserved for video recording on an image recording/reproducing apparatusonly by selecting the television programs displayed on the CRT screen,which contributes to making effective use of the teletext information onthe receiver.

Next, the transmission system of a fifth embodiment of the presentinvention is described with reference to FIG. 16, FIG. 17, and FIG. 19.FIG. 19 shows the structure of a data unit in the fifth embodiment ofthe invention and its transmission procedure.

With respect to the processing, this embodiment is equal in most part tothat of the fourth embodiment. The difference exists in that whileprogram title data length and program title themselves are transmittedin the fourth embodiment, the arrangement in this fifth embodiment issuch that data of program title display start position and displayterminate position in terms of horizontal and vertical relation on thescreen are transmitted when program title data is displayed on thescreen. This causes the receiver equipment side to be different in theway the program title data is picked up. In the fifth embodiment havingsuch an arrangement, 2-byte data is picked up from each of byte 11 andbyte 13 of the data unit section as the data of program title displaystart position and display terminate position, respectively, so that aprogram title data selected from the data and the program title datadecoded by the character-program data decoder section 4 is picked up. Bycarrying out the rest of the processing in the same manner as in thefourth embodiment, the same processing can be accomplished as in thefourth embodiment, as the whole system.

With the arrangement as described above, the result is such that, whilethe compatibility with the conventional teletext receiver equipment ismaintained, program title data transmitted as character-program data isutilized instead of program title data itself as program title datainformation, and there are transmitted, as added data, the data ofprogram title display start position and display terminate position inhorizontal and vertical relation on the screen when the program titledata is displayed on the screen as character-program data, allowing toreduce the amount of data to be transmitted.

The transmission system of a sixth embodiment of the present inventionis now described with reference to FIG. 16, FIG. 17, and FIG. 20.

FIG. 20 shows the structure of the data unit in the sixth embodiment ofthe invention and its transmission procedure. As understood from FIG.20, the sixth embodiment in contrast to the structure of the data unitin the fourth embodiment is so arranged that it involves added datalengths, added data control, and added data that is the relevant datacontent. The added data lengths represent the program broadcasting starttime, program broadcasting terminate time, program-classificationidentification index, program title data length, and data lengths ofadded data other than program title in the television programcorresponding to the television-program identification number. Thenumber of bytes of the added data to be transmitted succeeding to theadded data lengths is transmitted by the succeeding byte in binaryvalue. The added data control, which represents the type of the addeddata of the television program corresponding to the television-programidentification number and which represents by each bit whether its addeddata is present or not, is transmitted by the byte succeeding to theadded data lengths. Examples of the added data include data which givesinformation on programs in series when one television program isbroadcasted in series over a plurality of broadcasting channels.

With the above-described arrangement, in addition to television-programidentification number, program broadcasting start time, programbroadcasting terminate time, program-classification identificationindex, program title data length, program title, program title displaystart position, and program title display terminate position, it ispossible to further provide added data lengths representing data lengthsof television-program table information to be added other than theabove-described data, added data control representing the type of thedata to be added unless the added data length is 0 (i.e. when there isany television-program information to be added), and added data that isthe content of the relevant data, to the data unit section for eachtelevision-program number, and transmit them. As a result, it is madefeasible to make various types of added data, which may be possible inthe future, expandable while the compatibility with the conventionalteletext receiver equipment is maintained.

FIG. 21 shows a seventh embodiment of the present invention.

With the arrangement of the existing teletext transmission system andits receiver as shown in FIG. 1, to select a related teletext program orpage, it is necessary to designate and call the menu screen and furtherdesignate program number and page number while viewing the menu screen.This involves a problem that the character programs accumulated in thememory are limited to those of program numbers and page numbers that areat random or that have previously been designated.

To solve this problem, the seventh embodiment comprises: program typeinformation recognition means for providing a limitation on program typeinformation and recognizing that a relevant data unit is of program typeinformation from a received data-unit parameter; extraction means forextracting magazine number, program number, page number, program type,and the like from a data-unit data detected by the program typeinformation recognition means; program type detection means fordetecting program type of a character program or page selected anddisplayed; accumulation control means for accumulating in a memory, withpriority, a character program or page identical or related to theprogram type detected by the program type detection means; and searchand presentation means for searching and presenting a character programor page identical or related to the program type detected by the programtype detection means of the character program or page selected anddisplayed according to request for presentation of programs related tothe character program or page selected and displayed.

With the above-described arrangement, when program type information ofcharacter broadcasting programs such as news, weather, and stock marketare transmitted, it is possible to manage character broadcastingprograms for each program type by making use of received program typeinformation, accumulates with priority character programs or pages ofrelated program types, and search and present character programs orpages of related program types without designating program numbers.

Now the seventh embodiment is described in more detail with reference toFIG. 21 and FIG. 22.

In FIG. 21, A denotes a reception means for receiving teletext in thecoding transmission system. In this reception means A, designated bynumeral 1 is a character signal extracting section for extractingcharacter signals superimposed on vertical blanking periods from a videosignal a; 4 is a decoder section for decoding the character signalsextracted from the character signal extracting section 1 and developingthem into character graphics for display; 5 is a buffer memory sectionfor accumulating only the character signals extracted by the charactersignal extracting section 1; 6 is a display control section for actuallydisplaying display data developed into character graphics at the decodersection 4 onto a screen or the like; 7 is a video memory section forstoring display data to be actually displayed onto the screen or thelike by the display control section 6; and 8 is a sound generatorsection for actually performing sound generation according to the addedsound data decoded by the decoder section 4. Also, designated by numeral41 is a program type information recognition means for recognizing thata relevant data unit is of program type information from a data-unitparameter delivered from the reception means A; 42 is a extraction meansfor extracting magazine number, program number, page number, programtype, and the like from data-unit data detected by the program typeinformation recognition means 41; 43 is a program type detection meansfor detecting program type of a character program or page selected anddisplayed; 44 is an accumulation control means for accumulating in amemory with priority a character program or page identical or related tothe program type detected by the program type detection means 43; and 45is a search and presentation means for searching and presenting acharacter program or page identical or related to the program typedetected by the program type detection means 43 of the character programor page selected and displayed according to request for presentation ofprograms related to the character program or page selected anddisplayed.

The receiver constructed as described above is below described withregard to its operation.

First, the character signal extracting section 1 extracts charactersignals superimposed on 14H, 15H, 16H, and 21H from an input videosignal a. The decoder section 4 accumulates the character signalsextracted by the character signal extracting section 1 in the buffermemory section 5 while it extracts program data of the program numberneeding presentation from the character signals accumulated in thebuffer memory section 5. Then it decodes the character signals as shownin FIG. 8, writing character/graphic screen information into the videomemory section 7 through the display control section 6. The displaycontrol section 6 reads in series the character/graphic screeninformation written into the video memory section 7, yielding an outputof a display signal b. Further, the decoder section 4 decodes addedsound information, if any in the program data needing presentation,transmitting sound generation data to the sound generator section 8. Thesound generator section 8 produces a sound signal based on the soundgeneration data.

The detection of program type information is performed by the programtype information recognition means 41. The recognition of program typeinformation is performed by a data-unit parameter as shown in FIG. 7.The data-unit parameter representing program type information ishexadecimal data, which may be any 1-byte data except 20, 24, 28, 2C,30, 31, 32, 34, 35, 38, 39, 3B, 3C, 3D, 3E, and 3F. An example of thestructure of data group of program type information is shown in FIG. 22.Out of a program type information data unit recognized by the programtype information recognition means 41, the extraction means 42 readsmagazine number from PB 5 and PB 6 of the data unit of the program typeinformation data group, reads page number from PB 7, and reads programtype from PB 8. It also reads from PB 9 and the following in the samemanner. The program type detection means 43 picks up the magazinenumber, program number, and page number of the character programcurrently presented from the decoder section 4, and detects by theextraction means 42 a program type coincident with the magazine number,program number, and page number picked up. The accumulation controlmeans 4 controls the buffer memory section 5 so that it accumulates withpriority character programs of program numbers or page numbers identicalor related to the program information detected by the program typedetection means 43. The search and presentation means 45 searchescharacter programs or pages identical or related to the program typedetected by the program type detection means 43 of the character programor page selected and displayed according to request for presentation ofprograms related to the character program or page selected anddisplayed. Thus, relevant character-program data is delivered from thebuffer memory section 5 to the decoder section 4, so that it ispresented through the display control section 6.

As described above, according to the present embodiment, there are newlyprovided data-unit parameters for program type information by teletextin the coding transmission system, wherein magazine number, programnumber, page number, program type, and the like of the program typeinformation are transmitted as data-unit data. As a result, on thereception side, it is possible to manage character broadcasting programsfor each program type by making use of the received program typeinformation, so that character programs or pages of related programtypes are accumulated in the memory with priority or that characterprograms or pages of related program types can be searched and presentedwithout designating program numbers.

Now an eighth embodiment of the present invention is described. Thisembodiment provides a receiver in which time information such as yearinformation, month information, day information, hour information,minute information, and second information are defined when intransmission, and in which time information is recognized and processedso that on the reception side time setting and time correction for year,month, day, minute, second, and the like are automatically performed bymaking use of the received time information.

Therefore, the present embodiment comprises: time informationrecognition means for providing a limitation on time information andrecognizing that a relevant data unit is of time information from areceived data unit parameter; time information processing means forprocessing time information such as year information, month information,day information, hour information, minute information, and secondinformation from the data-unit data detected by the time informationrecognition means; and time information setting means for automaticallysetting time information such as year information, month information,day information, hour information, minute information, and secondinformation obtained by the time information processing means.

With such an arrangement, it is possible to automatically detect timeinformation data out of character broadcasting program data, andautomatically perform time setting and time correction for year, month,day, hour, minute, second, and the like.

The transmission system and receiver of the eighth embodiment of theinvention is described in more detail with reference to FIG. 23 and FIG.24.

In FIG. 23, designated by numeral 1 is a character signal extractingsection for extracting character signals superimposed on verticalblanking periods from a video signal a; 4 is a decoder section fordecoding the character signals extracted by the character signalextracting section 1 and developing them into character graphics fordisplay; 5 is a buffer memory section for accumulating only thecharacter signals extracted by the character signal extracting section1; 6 is a display control section for actually displaying display datadeveloped into character graphics at the decoder section 4 onto a screenor the like; 7 is a video memory section for storing display data to beactually displayed onto the screen or the like by the display controlsection 6; and 8 is a sound generator section for actually performingsound generation according to added sound data decoded by the decodersection 4. Further, designated by numeral 47 is a time informationrecognition means for recognizing that a relevant data unit is of timeinformation from a data-unit parameter delivered from the receptionmeans A; 48 is a time information processing means for processing timeinformation such as year information, month information, dayinformation, hour information, minute information, and secondinformation from data-unit data detected by the time informationrecognition means 47; 49 is a time information setting means forautomatically setting time information such as year information, monthinformation, day information, hour information, minute information, andsecond information obtained by the time information processing means 48;and 50 is an image recording apparatus for performing video-recordingoperation according to the time information such as year information,month information, day information, hour information, minuteinformation, and second information set by the time information settingmeans 49.

The receiver constructed as described above is below described withregard to its operation, referring to FIG. 23 and FIG. 24.

First, the character signal extracting section 1 extracts charactersignals superimposed on 14H, 15H, 16H, and 21H from the input videosignal a. The decoder section 4 accumulates the character signalsextracted by the character signal extracting section 1 in the buffermemory section 5 while it extracts program data of program numbersneeding presentation from the character signals accumulated in thebuffer memory section 5. Then it decodes the character signals as shownin FIG. 8, writing character/graphic screen information into the videomemory section 7 through the display control section 6. The displaycontrol section 6 reads in series the character/graphic screeninformation written into the video memory section 7, yielding an outputof display signal b. Further, the decoder section 4 decodes added soundinformation, if any in the program data needing presentation,transmitting sound generation data to the sound generator section 8. Thesound generator section 8 produces a sound signal based on the soundgeneration data.

The detection of time information is performed by the time informationrecognition means 47. The recognition of time information is performedby a data-unit parameter as shown in FIG. 7. The data-unit parameterrepresenting time information is hexadecimal data, which may be any1-byte except 20, 24, 28, 2C, 30, 31, 32, 34, 35, 38, 39, 3B, 3C, 3D,3E, and 3F. An example of the structure of the time information datagroup is shown in FIG. 24. Out of the time information data unitrecognized and extracted by the time information recognition means 47,the time information processing means 48 reads year from PB 5 and PB 6of the data unit of the time information data group, reads month from PB7, reads day from PB 8, reads hour from PB 9, reads minute from PB 10,and reads day of the week from PB 11. The time information read by thetime information processing means 48 is set to the image recordingapparatus 50 by the time information setting means 49.

With such an arrangement, by newly providing data-unit parameters fortime information by teletext in the coding transmission system and bytransmitting the year information, month information, day information,hour information, minute information, second information, and the likeof the time information as data-unit data, it is possible toautomatically perform time setting and time correction for year, month,day, hour, minute, second, and the like and to utilize them forvideo-recording reservation operation on an image recording/reproducingapparatus or the like, thus allowing the information on teletext to beutilized on the receiver.

Industrial Applicability

According to the present invention, television-program table informationby teletext in the coding transmission system can be automaticallydetected and displayed on a display unit, and reservation of a videorecording on an image recording/reproducing apparatus such as a VTR cansimply be performed only by selecting among the television numbersdisplayed on the screen of the display unit with the cursor, thusallowing the information on teletext to be effectively utilized on thereceiver side. Furthermore, it follows up any change in thetelevision-program table information.

What is claimed is:
 1. A receiver, comprising:reception means forreceiving teletext data from a coding transmission system, wherein (1)recognition information and program-content update information of atelevision-program table are formatted using a page presentation datastructure and presentation update control data structure, each of whichhave a predetermined number of bits, and (2) channel information, dateinformation, time information, program code information, and titleinformation of the television-program table are formatted as videoinformation having a predetermined screen arrangement; programrecognition means for recognizing television-program table informationfrom a predetermined bit of the page presentation data structure;program update recognizing means, responsive to a group of predeterminedbits of the presentation update control data structure, for recognizingthat the television-program table information has been updated; channelinformation processing means for processing channel information of afirst character string of a first text line from a screen arrangementdetected by said program recognition means; date information processingmeans for processing date information of a second character string ofthe first text line from the screen arrangement detected by said programrecognition means; time information processing means for processing timeinformation from the screen arrangement detected by said programrecognition means; program code information processing means forprocessing program code information from the screen arrangement detectedby said program recognition means; title information processing meansfor processing the title information from the screen arrangementdetected by said program recognition means; display means for displayingonto a display unit, as a displayed television-program table, the dataprocessed by said program update recognizing means, channel informationprocessing means, date information processing means, time informationprocessing means, program code information processing means and titleinformation processing means; cursor display means for displaying acursor said display unit; cursor moving means for moving the cursordisplayed by said cursor display means so as to designate televisionprograms contained in the displayed television-program table; selectionmeans for selecting, for reservation for video recording, ones of theprograms, designated by the cursor displayed by said cursor displaymeans; storage means for storing television-program table informationsuch as channel information, date information, time information, programcode information and title information of the corresponding to the onesof the programs selected by said selection means; timer means forperforming time management; comparator means for comparing the dateinformation and time information of the table information stored in saidstorage means with date information and time information of said timermeans; start instruction means for instructing an imagerecording/reproducing apparatus to start a video-recording operationwhen a starting time represented by the date information and timeinformation of the stored table information coincides with the dateinformation and time information of said timer means; and terminationinstruction means for instructing the image recording/reproducingapparatus to terminate the video-recording operation when a terminationtime represented by the date information and time information of thestored table information coincides with the date information and timeinformation of said timer means.
 2. A method of using transmittedprogram information to reserve time to record a program, wherein thetransmitted program information includes television-program tableinformation including channel information, date information, timeinformation, program code information and title information and istransmitting, using teletext formatting, said method comprising thesteps of:receiving the television table information at an imagerecording apparatus; recognizing the television-program tableinformation where program numbers indicative of the television programtable information are fixed, where said television program tableinformation such as channel information, date information, timeinformation, program code information and title information aretransmitted by code data such thatsaid channel information isrepresented by a first character string of a first text line in a 2-bytesystem, said date information is represented by a character stringsucceeding the channel information consisting of 1-byte system,2-character month data and 2-character day data, and a symbol insertedbetween the month data and the day data for dividing the two pieces ofthe data, said time information including start time informationdesignated as indispensable and terminate time information designated asdispensable, and being assigned by a character string consisting of1-byte system, 2-character 24-hour-system hour data and 2-characterminute data, and a symbol inserted between the hour data and the minutedata for dividing the two pieces of data, a symbol added between thestart information and the terminate time information for dividing thetwo pieces of information, the program code information being assignedby a character string of 1-byte system 2-character immediately followingthe character string representing the time information, and said titleinformation being assigned a character string, whose location can befound from immediately after the program code information to before anext-program time information character string; and reserving time, forvideo recording, on the image recording apparatus according to thereceived television-program table information.
 3. A receiver,comprising:reception means for receiving teletext data from a codingtransmission system in which program numbers of television-program tableinformation are fixed and to which program-content update information,channel information, date information, time information, program codeinformation and title information are formatted as video information;program recognition means for recognizing television-program tableinformation from the fixed program numbers; program update recognizingmeans for recognizing and processing any update of thetelevision-program table information content from the television-programtable information detected by said program recognition means; channelinformation processing means for processing channel information of afirst character string on a first text line from the television-programtable information detected by said program recognition means; dateinformation processing means for processing date information of a secondcharacter string on the first text line from the television-programtable information detected by said program recognition means; timeinformation processing means for processing the time information fromthe television-program table information detected by said programrecognition means; program code information processing means forprocessing program code information from the television-program tableinformation detected by said program recognition means; titleinformation processing means for processing the title information fromthe television-program table information detected by said programrecognition means; display means for displaying onto a display unit, asa displayed television-program table, the data processed by said programupdate recognizing means, channel information processing means, dateinformation processing means, time information processing means, programcode information processing means and title information processingmeans; cursor display means for displaying a cursor for each program oftelevision programs displayed by said display means; cursor moving meansfor moving the cursor displayed by said cursor display means so as todesignate programs contained in the displayed television-program table;selection means for selecting, for reservation for video recording, onesof programs, designated by the cursor displayed by said cursor displaymeans; storage means for storing television-program table informationsuch as channel information, date information, time information, programcode information and title information corresponding to the ones of theprograms selected by said selection means; timer means for performingtime management; comparator means for comparing the date information andtime information of the table information stored in said storage meanswith date information and time information of said timer means; startinstruction means for instructing an image recording/reproducingapparatus to start a video-recording operation when it is judged by saidcomparator means that a starting time represented by the dateinformation and time information of the stored table informationcoincides with the date information and time information of said timermeans; and termination instruction means for instructing the imagerecording/reproducing apparatus to terminate the video-recordingoperation when it is judged by said comparator means that a terminatetime represented by the date information and time information of thestored table information coincides with the date information and timeinformation of said timer means.
 4. A method of using transmittedprogram information to reserve time to record a program, wherein thetransmitted program information includes television-program tableinformation including channel information, date information, timeinformation, program code information and title information and istransmitting, using teletext formatting, said method comprising thesteps of:receiving the television table information at an imagerecording apparatus; recognizing the television-program tableinformation; and reserving time, for video recording, at the imagerecording apparatus according to the received television-program tableinformation, wherein the step of recognizing the television-programtable information uses a sign for identification of added service datawhich is assigned to a data group identification sign for performingidentification of program management data or page data and programsearch data at a data group header section so that a channelidentification number for identifying a broadcasting channel at a dataheader section, a program-content update index for notifying any updateof program content, and a program broadcasting date for representingbroadcasting date of a program are added as data; a parameter foridentification of being a data header related to added services isassigned to data header parameters for identifying a program dataheader, a page data header and a program search data header so that atelevision-program identification number for identifying each televisionprogram broadcast a day at a data-unit section, a program-classificationidentification index for representing program broadcasting smart time,program broadcasting terminate time, and type of program content,program-title data length for representing data length of a programtitle are added as data; and a parameter for identification of beingadded service data is assigned to data-unit parameters for identifying atype of data unit such as text, header text, and added soundinformation.
 5. A method of using transmitted program information toreserve time to record a program, wherein the transmitted programinformation includes television-program table information includingchannel information, date information, time information, program codeinformation and title information and is transmitting, using teletextformatting, said method comprising the steps of:receiving the televisiontable information at an image recording apparatus; recognizing thetelevision-program table information; and reserving time, for videorecording, on the image recording apparatus according to the receivedtelevision-program table information, wherein the step of recognizingthe television-program table information uses a sign for identificationof added service data which is assigned to a data group identificationsign for performing identification of program management data or pagedata and program search data at a data group header section so that achannel identification number for identifying a broadcasting channel ata data header section, a program-content update index for notifying anyupdate of program content, and a program broadcasting date forrepresenting broadcasting date of a program are added as data; aparameter for identification of being an added service data header isnewly assigned to data header parameters for identifying a program dataheader, a page data header, and a program search data header so that atelevision-program identification number for identifying each televisionprogram broadcast a day at a data-unit section, a program-classificationidentification index for representing program broadcasting start time,program broadcasting terminate time, and type of program content,program-title display start position and program-title display terminateposition for representing display position of a program title invertical and horizontal directions when program title data is displayedon a screen are added as data; and a parameter for identification ofbeing added service data is newly assigned to data-unit parameters foridentifying a type of data unit such as text, header text and addedsound information.
 6. The method as claimed in claim 4 or 5 wherein, inaddition to television program identification number, programbroadcasting start time, program broadcasting terminate time,program-classification identification index, program title data length,program title, and, in claim 5, the program broadcasting start time,program broadcasting terminate time, program-classificationidentification index, program title display smart position, and programtitle display terminate position,a data length value representing datalength of television-program table information being added to theforegoing data, a data control value representing type of data to beadded unless the added data length is
 0. 7. A method of usingtransmitted program information to reserve time to record a program,wherein the transmitted program information includes television-programtable information including channel information, date information, timeinformation, program code information and title information and istransmitting, using teletext formatting, said method comprising thesteps of:receiving the television table information at an imagerecording apparatus; reserving time, for video recording, on the imagerecording apparatus according to the received television-program tableinformation; wherein the television-program table information beingdesignated by bit 3 of a page presentation data structure; instructionof update of the television-program table information being designatedby bit 3, bit 4, bit 7, and bit 8 of presentation update control datastructure; the channel information, date information, time information,program code information and title information of the television-programtable information being transmitted by code data, the channelinformation being of 2-byte system and assigned a first character stringof a first text line, the date information consisting of 1-byte system2-character month data and 2-character day data and a symbol insertedbetween the month data and the day data for dividing the two pieces ofdata, and being assigned by a character string succeeding thefirst-text-line channel information, the time information includingstart time information designated as indispensable and terminate timeinformation designated as dispensable, being assigned by a characterstring consisting of 1-byte system 2-character 24-hour-system hour dataand 2-character minute data and a symbol inserted between the hour dataand the minute data for dividing the two pieces of data, and a symboladded between the start time information and the terminate timeinformation for dividing the two pieces of information, the program codeinformation being assigned by a character string of 1-byte system2-character immediately following the character string representing thetime information, and the title information being assigned by acharacter string ranging from immediately after the program codeinformation to before the next-program time information characterstring.